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Monday, December 29, 2014

Nebraskans again polled on gay marriage; Nebraska Family Alliance again lies about judicial fiat

The Omaha World-Herald just reported the results of a poll it commissioned on Nebraskans' current views about gay marriage (41% here in Omaha, the state's biggest city, oppose it) and got another audaciously false precis by the head of the financially secretive Nebraska Family Alliance, which spearheaded a 10,000-signature petition drive to block the LGBT fairness ordinance passed 5-0 by the Lincoln City Council in 2012. Here's Rev. Al Riskowski's newest dissembly:

“Even though marriage has been
overturned in a vast majority of states, in almost every situation it
was a federal judge who overturned it and not the will of the people,”
said Riskowski, executive director of the Nebraska Family Alliance.

A couple paragraphs later, the World-Herald called Rev. Riskowski on his bullshit:

Courts were responsible for
overturning same-sex marriage bans or legalizing gay marriage in 23 of
the 35 states where it is currently legal. State legislatures legalized
gay marriage in nine states, while voters approved it in three:
Washington state, Maine and Maryland.

Even in states in which a federal judge "overturned" marriage (as Riskowski deceptively described extending the marriage franchise to same sex couples) it was oftena case of judges or a judge affirming the decision of state jurisprudence, not overruling that decision.The most starting disparity in support for marriage equality revealed by the poll was by political party: 72% of Republicans in Nebraska opposed gay marriage; 54% of Democrats favor it.
Below: opposition to Lincoln's 2012 LGBT fairness ordinance, orchestrated largely by ultra-right-wing pastors like Rev. Riskowski, proved to be a river of junk science, bald animus, fear-mongering and class slander.

Maynard (Bob "Gilligan's Island" Denver) slyly flashes a nipple to the CBS eye while trying to talk his best buddy Dobie Gillis (Dwayne Hick­man) into taking off all his clothes. Whoever said 1950s television was a vast waste­land obviously didn't know where to look.